Board looks past Lodi to Galt for North Campus

On Nov. 9 the Delta College Board of Trustees denied the building of a new campus in Lodi, moving forward with likely plans to build a North Campus in Galt.

Delta College has long discussed building a North Campus, but had not decided on a location. Four Lodi properties were considered in the closed-session meeting.

None gained approval.

“I think [building a Galt campus] is a good idea because if they have a campus for Galt I could probably walk to school. That would be so much easier… instead of driving I could go home and sleep during my breaks … I wouldn’t be wasting so much money on gas. Five days a week coming to Stockton is a lot of gas,” said Alexis Renteria, a Delta student who commutes about forty minutes every day from Galt.

The expansion of Delta will not only benefit current students who commute from the northern cities, but also future students of Delta.

“For the future kids, like my little brother, it’ll be easier for them to go to college… I think it will [increase the number of Galt students attending college] because it’s more accessible to us so people will say ‘might as well, college is right next door,’” Renteria added.

The decision to expand to Galt wasn’t a quick one.

The board previously discussed the possibility of Lodi as the as a North campus location but the idea has now been rejected.

So the question is: Why Galt?

“I think they chose Galt because it’s growing… we have a lot of new things there and Galt is a really great place for people to live and I think it’s going to get bigger in the future,” said Renteria.

The Galt-based campus will be Delta College’s second permanent satellite location.

The Mountain House campus, located west of Tracy off of Interstate 205, opened in 2009.

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